Bad Karma (38 page)

He stopped her, cupped her cheek in his palms and softly rubbed his thumb over her lips. His expression painted an eloquent portrait of anger and sorrow. “We need to talk.”

His softly spoken words sent a shiver down her spine.

Sky and Zach had reached the deck level and, perhaps sensing the thick atmosphere of emotions in the air, silently ducked inside the house with their burdens.

Javier’s eyes held hers, dark and dangerous, brimming with anguish. “Were you ever going to tell me?”

She wanted to run away, but she was trapped. Trapped by the hands caressing her cheeks, by the deep, velvety voice enfolding her, by the rock hard thighs imprisoning her.

She swallowed, summoning her courage. “Tell you...?”

“
My God, Cassie! How many secrets have you kept from me?”

“
Just the one. . .two maybe.”

He let out a short mirthless laugh and looked away, releasing her from his spell, then skewered her once again with his gaze. “Graduating from high school at fifteen? The scholarships and grants? All the honors and degrees you earned...Didn’t I deserve to know these things about you?”

Tears welled in her eyes, but she blinked them away. “Yes, you did. I was wrong not to tell you, but...”

“
Do you think I’m too stupid to comprehend?”

“
No, of course not.”

“
You let me think your career was delivering sandwiches when you had a teaching job lined up.”

“
I’m so sorry, Javi.”

“
Were you laughing at me when I offered to support you and let you further your education?”

Cassie drew a shaky breath and licked her lips again. “No, but...”

A muscle in his jaw twitched. “Do you know the worst thing? The worst thing is that everybody else seems to know all about you. Everybody but me.”

“
I didn’t tell anyone.”

“
And yet, the only person kept in the dark was your big, freakin’ dumb boyfriend.”

“
Please, Javi!”

He glared down at her, contemplated her mouth before delivering a cruel punishing kiss, devouring her, bleeding her soul dry.

It felt like goodbye.

He pulled away, still holding her face in his hands. Setting his teeth on edge, he glared at her ferociously. Some deep emotion seemed to wrack his body. He shuddered and pushed her away. Getting off the table, he strode toward the stairs.

She managed to choke out his name. “Javi!”

He turned, narrowing his gaze as he shook his head. “You know, I love you more than my life, but I don’t know if I ever want to be with you again.” He gave her a long, last look and departed.

Cassie heard him start the truck, sounding like the powerful roar of a wounded animal. She wanted to run after him, to beg his forgiveness.

But she didn’t.

She leaned against the railing of the deck and watched the big red truck depart, carrying inside it her shredded heart and the hottest man on the planet.

~*~

Javier drove away, feeling like he’d been gutted. Like one of the big fish brought in by the sports fishermen and hung up, disemboweled for public display.

He could still taste her kiss on his lips, feel her soft skin on his fingertips and smell the pear-scented shampoo she favored.

The pain was so razor sharp; he thought maybe it would kill him. That would be a relief. Then he wouldn’t have to feel. He wouldn’t have to want her. He wouldn’t have the urge to strangle her with his bare hands.

He smacked the steering wheel with his palm.

It had taken everything he had to walk away from her. To leave her standing there with her beautiful face looking like he’d torn the heart right out of her. But he had to.

Jorge’s right. She’s much too good for me. She should be with someone exceptional, a college professor or brain surgeon. Not an average Joe lowly public servant.

He parked in front of his new apartment and sat stewing in his assigned parking space for a while. He didn’t want to be alone, but he didn’t want to be with most of the people he knew.

He didn’t want to be around anyone who would pat his cheek and poor-baby him.

Most of all, he didn’t want to hear anyone say, “I told you so.”

He climbed out of the truck and rode up to his apartment in the silent elevator. Tomorrow, he would return to work. He’d be on duty for seventy-two hours where he might be able to focus on something besides Cassidy Danforth.

He unlocked his apartment and stepped inside. The scene hit him like a fist.

All of the furniture he’d chosen with Cassie had been delivered. The manager must have let the delivery men in. He stared at the plastic-wrapped sofa and the other items still in boxes. The bed frame and Queen-size mattresses leaned against the wall.

Javier expelled a long breath and locked the door behind him. He could call the store tomorrow to return everything. Or he could face the fact that he had made choices and they had blown up in his face.

He picked up the bed frame and lugged it to the bedroom, determined to make the best of the situation. He would make his bed...and he would pay it off and he would lie in it.

When the bed was assembled and the mattress and box springs were in place, he moved it near the floor to ceiling window at the far side of the room. It looked out on the bay. He’d wanted Cassie to have a view of the water when she awoke.

He choked down something that tasted like bile. If he could get through tonight and the following seventy-two hours on duty, there was a chance he could get over her. Get over the girl who owned his soul. Stop aching to kiss her, to press her sweet little body against his. Grow scar tissue over his bleeding heart.

It shouldn’t be hard to do, especially when she thinks I’m a total idiot.

~*~

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Ammunition

Sky peered out through the curtains onto the deck. “I think they broke up.”

Zach looked skeptical. “Javier was upset, but he’s crazy about her. A man doesn’t blow away a once in a lifetime kind of love because of some little detail she didn’t tell him... They’ll fight about it. They’ll say I’m sorry and they’ll make up. It’s all part of the game.”

Sky frowned, sensing it was much more serious. “This is Cassie we’re talking about. She’s my brilliant little geek sister. She doesn’t play games. She doesn’t know how.”

Zach came to stand behind her, pulling her back to rest against his chest. He wrapped his arms around her and pressed kisses to the side of her face.

Sky sighed, feeling incredibly lucky to have found a man like Zach. Since she’d dated more than her fair share of assholes, she could appreciate what a treasure he was. Good taste had never been her forte. She marveled at her excellent fortune in finding such a man and wished her sister had been as lucky.

She let out a huff of exasperation. “She’s just standing at the railing, staring out at the water.”

Zach peeked out through the curtains. “Maybe she needs some alone time to sort things out.”

Sky shook her head. “This is Cassie we’re talking about. She lives on a different planet from the rest of us. She has isolation hardwired into her brain.”

Zach gave her a hug. “Let’s see if she’d like to go out for dinner or to see a movie.”

Sky turned around and kissed his cheek. “Have I mentioned lately, that I’m madly in love with you?”

His green eyes twinkled as he assumed a dance pose and lowered her into a fancy dip. “Not nearly enough.”

When they joined Cassie at the railing, she was surprisingly dry-eyed.

“
He left,” she said. “Javier left me.”

Zach put his hand on her shoulder. “Javier will come around. I know that he loves you, Cassie.”

She nodded. “That’s what he said, but he doesn’t want to be with me anymore.”

Sky put both arms around Cassie and held her with their heads leaned together.
Funny.
It had always been Cassie who’d held her when some guy had broken her heart. It had been Cassie who had told her that the guy wasn’t worth it and that someone better would come along.

She’d been right about that one.

Cassie’s attention was fastened on something out in the Gulf. “Look at all the surfers on the water. It looks so beautiful out there.”

Zach leaned his elbows against the railing. “Whenever there’s a storm coming in the waves are higher. All the surf bums come in droves. Rafael and his deputies have to practically carry them off the Island and barricade the causeway.”

Sky made a disgusted sound in the back of her throat. “Don’t they have any better sense than to tempt fate like that?”

“
Adrenalin junkies. They live for the highest wave, the fastest ride.” He gave a little chuckle. “One thing for sure, my brother, Calvin is planning the ultimate hurricane party at the Bait Camp Bar.”

Cassie turned to him, showing interest for the first time. “Hurricane party? What’s that about?”

“
Some of the locals like to thumb their noses at the storm. They dance and drink and party right up to the time the storm is blowing in.”

She shot him an incredulous gaze. “That’s insane.”

He grinned. “It’s like the guys who run with the bulls in Pamplona. They say the greatest rush is running so close you can feel the bull’s breath on your neck.”

A little spiral of fear swirled through Sky’s gut. “Do you really think a hurricane will hit anywhere near here?”

He turned to look at her. “You never know. This one has picked up strength and is headed for Cuba right now. The weatherman said it had been upgraded to a category one hurricane. We should watch the weather report tonight and get the latest storm coordinates.”

Sky shivered, acknowledging the icy tingle making its way down her spine. “You seem so calm about it, Zach. Doesn’t the possibility of having a hurricane hit close to home scare you even a little?”

He smiled and stroked his hand over the back of her hair. “The good thing about hurricanes is that you have plenty of time to plan for them and get out of their way, not like tornadoes that strike suddenly out of the blue. Most likely, this won’t amount to much. It may lose strength and go back to being a tropical storm or it could gather strength and become a category five hurricane. It could hit land or blow itself out at sea.”

“
Aren’t you worried about losing your home?”

He picked up her hand and pressed it to his lips. “If it looks like a storm is headed our way I’ll do my best to board everything up and take my most precious possessions with me to some safe place.”

Sky turned to meet his gaze. “Your most precious possessions?”

He put an arm around Cassie and the other around Sky and pulled them close. “Yeah, the Danforth girls.”

~*~